Change was hovering on the horizon, invisible but looming. I could feel its weight the same way I could feel the eyes of the panthers on my skin when I visited Atlantis, or the way the wolves tracked my movements in the North.

I was eager to meet it.

It had taken all of my self-control not to fall upon Thranduil when I returned, rabid for the taste of his blood on my tongue for daring to usurp the position that was rightfully mine. It did not matter that it was not truly his fault, nor that ambition was hardly a fault in a brother. What mattered was that he had sought to step where I had stood, to claim the title that belonged to me.

In the end, he was hard to find. Harder still to sink teeth into and eventually the mindless droning of the Lagoon did what it did best: it dulled the anger. It dulled the hatred. It did not dull the simmering darkness in my chest, but that hardly surprised me. Little did.

A commotion near the mangrove-choked shoreline drew my gaze and I watched lazily as Garmr moved to intercept the golden newcomer. As he did not seem to be the product of a raid, I wasn't particularly interested until the scent of my birth island drifted between us and assaulted my nostrils. Bored as I was, I meandered in that direction although I doubted that Garmr needed assistance of any kind in handling a new brother. There was a reason he had stood strong as our boss for so long.

I slunk forward with lazy grace, heavy muscling taut beneath my painted coat. The boy did not look like family to me, nor did he smell of Rafe or Raegar or Arsinoe, but he might as well have been given the mouth on him.

"Careful with that tongue pup," I drawled as I entered their grouping, my dark eyes fathomless as they locked onto his fresh face. "Or we might cut it out until you learn how to wield it with respect." I don't bother to look at Garmr, though I do lazily drop my head to brush my muzzle against an inner knee as if to imply this boy was no threat.

"One thing you'll learn about the Lagoon boy," I reinforce the moniker that Garmr had chosen, a smirk curling along my pink lips, "is that you're never really alone here. Best you learn that lesson quick."

Stallion - Young Adult - 15.2 - Brown Overo